Whether it’s your first holiday season with Walmart Marketplace or you’re a longtime seller, we’re here to help with the latest tips and tools to guide you through it. While customers gear up for finding the perfect gifts for everyone on their lists, polish your listings, refine your shipping strategy, and prep your inventory using the checklist below.
Make a pricing list and check it twice…or three times
Prepare your catalog for the holidays by keeping a close eye on pricing and promotions.
Set up promo pricing
Attract customers with promotions and call out best-of-web deals with Reduced Price and Clearance flags and strikethrough pricing.
Keep an eye on inventory
Ramp up your inventory and monitor in-stock rates to avoid overselling. Use the Unpublished Items dashboard to address any unpublished listings.
Shine bright with high-quality listings
Get your listings in sparkling shape and take the guesswork out of it with the Listing Quality and Rewards Dashboard.
- Promote your best items with Sponsored Products ads. Sharpen your advertising strategy with some tips from the Holiday Search Campaign Guide.
- Gain the Pro Seller Badge when you meet the criteria, including a Listing Quality Score of at least 60% for 70% of your trending catalog.
- Be sure to have clear Titles, Descriptions, Images, and Attributes for all your listings.
- Include at least 4 high-resolution, professional photos.
- Offer best-of-web deals and call out competitive pricing with Clearance and Reduced Price flags.
Give the gift of fast shipping
Fast & free delivery can help you convert more customers. Choose your preferred delivery program from our portfolio of fast-shipping solutions.
- Optimize your shipping settings with custom Shipping Templates for improved catalog performance.
- Enable free TwoDay and ThreeDay Delivery nationwide or regionally to improve your product visibility and conversion.
- Diversify your portfolio of shipping carriers, or upgrade to better shipping methods to prep for last-minute shopping and extend your shipping cutoff dates if possible.
- Follow our packaging rules and ship same business day with valid tracking.
- Leverage Walmart Fulfillment Services to offer free two-day delivery.
What was under the tree last year?
During the 2020 Holiday shopping season, we saw:
Source: Walmart 1st-party data., June 2021.. Reflecting Nov. 1 – Dec. 31, 2020.
purchased each week
purchased each week
purchased each week
Connect with more customers and make your products stand out by leveraging Walmart Sponsored Products.
Make returns easy for your customers
Not every gift can be a perfect fit, but an easy returns experience can leave a good impression.
- Delight customers with longer return windows if you haven’t already. Review your Returns settings in your Partner Profile.
- Remember that most items have been moved to an Enhanced Returns experience, which allows customers to initiate returns online or in stores. There are a few exceptions to this standardized return process, including freight and hazmat items (review the list of eligible exceptions here).
- Delight customers with an even better returns experience and revisit your settings by 10/31. When you offer an extended holiday returns window, customers who purchase or receive items between November 1 and December 25 will have additional time to return their items if needed.
- Include packing slips with all your items to streamline returns.
- Enable Replacement Rules in Seller Center.
Stay on the ‘nice’ list
Customer service is even more important this time of year.
- Provide excellent customer service within 48 hours (including weekends)
- Acknowledge and empathize with the customer’s issue.
- Maintain professionalism in your responses by double-checking grammar & spelling and use pre-written templates in Message Center to quickly respond.
- All messages require a response, so please monitor the Message Center frequently.
- Keep your information up to date in Seller Center so customers and Walmart can reach you when needed.